Grazing land in the southwest of the United States often has considerable amounts of scrub trees and mesquite growing thereon and these scrub trees and mesquite occasionally must be cleared from the grazing lands in order to realize full benefit thereof. However, southwest grazing lands are extremely extensive in area and considerable time must be spent by conventional methods to remove scrub trees and mesquite even when the grazing lands are only sparcely covered by trees and mesquite.
In the past, scrub trees and mesquite have been cleared from grazing lands through the utilization of root plows, but root plows often disturb the grass roots and create weed problems requiring reseeding of grass and the land to lay idle for three or four years. Of course, the grass of the southwest grasslands is allowed to flourish when mesquite and scrub trees can be eliminated with the result that the grasslands may be used to graze larger cattle herds.
Accordingly, a need exists for mechanized structure by which mesquite and scrub trees may be removed from large areas of grasslands without adversely affecting the grass thereon and in a minimum of time and with a minimum of expenditure of funds.
Although various forms of shrub cutters including large capacity rotary cutter heads and other devices including some of the general structural features of the instant invention have been heretofore provided, these scrub cutters and other structures have not been specifically designed for heavy duty use in clearing scrub trees and mesquite from grasslands in an efficient manner. Examples of some of the previously known structures referred to above are disclosed in U.S. Pat. Nos. 2,197,549, 2,475,716, 3,087,296 and 3,654,750.